June Angus, West London Socialist Party
In the US, the price of eggs has become a symbolic marker of inflation and the increased cost of living. In January 2025, the national average price of a dozen eggs reached $4.95 (£3.93), a 65% increase since 2024. In some states, like California, a dozen eggs costs as much as $13.49 (£10.71).
While inflation has caused prices of many groceries and household goods to skyrocket, the increasing price of eggs has also been accelerated by an outbreak of H5N1 (a strain of avian flu) that has been spreading across North American farms since March 2024. Millions of chickens have been culled, 15% of egg-laying chickens have been culled in the last four months. The decrease in total laying chickens is driving prices up. The disease, the spread of which has been exacerbated by unsafe intensive farming methods, has also begun spreading into the human population.
During the 2024 presidential election, Donald Trump promised to reduce the price of goods such as eggs. Many working-class Americans struggling with the cost of living voted for him based on these promises, but Trump has no interest in helping working-class people, only the interests of himself and the ultra-wealthy in his close circle of supporters.
Despite the spread of H5N1, he has also launched attacks on the sciences: he aims to defund essential research, has withdrawn from the World Health Organisation (WHO), and appointed Robert F. Kennedy Jr. – a leading anti-vaccine activist and conspiracy theorist – as Secretary of Health. This could be catastrophic for both agriculture and health and will remind many of the tragic mishandling of the Covid-19 pandemic. Trump’s tariffs, particularly on Mexican agricultural products, will also likely drive further price hikes.
The solution to these problems, both pricing and public health, is to bring big agriculture and food production businesses under the democratic control of the working class. Instead of pitting health and nutrition against the interests of profit, agriculture should provide the food that people need. Increased safety measures and publicly funded research could prevent future outbreaks of diseases like H5N1. Under capitalism, our very essentials like food will always be at the mercy of the drive for profits; it’s time for a socialist system that actually fulfils our needs.
